After the most traumatic weekend of his managerial career it would have been easy for Jackie McNamara to go into hiding.
The elation of Saturday’s League Cup semi-final win over Aberdeen quickly evaporated as Stuart Armstrong and Gary Mackay-Steven left for Celtic.
Naturally Dundee United supporters were angry at the news with the departures coming less than a year after the £6m sales of Andy Robertson and Ryan Gauld.
Scouting, nurturing and developing players isn’t an exact science, there are no conveyor belts out there churning out players of the calibre of Gauld, Robertson, Armstrong and Mackay-Steven.
Responding to the despair of their supporters United issued a statement defending their position, predictably pointing the finger at the new Celtic players for angling to move on.
McNamara experienced a similar situation 20 years ago when he left Dunfermline for Celtic and put a more realistic take on the transfers yesterday.
“The fans and other people might look at it and think we’ve given up on what we have,” he admitted. “But I can tell them there’s no way that’s true.
“Like every other United fan, I’m disappointed to see them go when we’re still going on three fronts but I still have loads of faith in this squad, we want to keep moving forward and we’ll do that together.
“We’ve brought in Paul Dixon, Robbie Muirhead, Henri Anier and Ryan McGowan. We have Blair Spittal, Charlie Telfer, Aidan Connolly and other young players coming through.
“It’s my job to make sure the team keeps moving forward and we do that by bringing through more players, signing the right players and keeping the club going in the right direction.”
Assessing the loss of four key players in less than twelve months he added: “We expected to lose them both last summer. I felt that when they came back in pre-season they saw it as a chance missed.
“They wondered why the younger ones (Gauld and Robertson) had gone before them.
“I think they just felt they wanted to get the move now. As disappointed as we are to lose them, we have to be sensible as well.
“It’s easy to say wait until the summer but in the past we’ve sold Johnny Russell for peanuts — £750,000 — and Craig Conway, too. When a player goes into the last year of his contract the club loses power.
“It happens at every club. We’re just going through it now because we have a lot of talented players who other clubs want.”
Sadly for Dundee United supporters it’s not the loss of the next player that they should worry about- it’s the departure of the manager who has developed and sold on close to £10m of players in two seasons in charge at Tannadice.
